Most importantly, Carly Levy responded to the chat stating that “Our desire to be recognized as licensed clinicians dominates social work culture and distorts macro social work purpose”. In a recent Twitter chat about Sustaining innovation in macro social work, the importance of macro social work came up. You will need to be experienced with both interpersonal relations and community involvement when you choose this level of work. Because social workers practicing mezzo work face unique challenges, they generally will have experience in both micro and macro work and use this experience in tandem. Instead of working with an individual or a familial group to promote individual change, you will work with groups to focus on promoting cultural or institutional change. The application and understanding of these levels are not only germane to social work, but they are integral in the analysis of business, finance, politics, science, and more.Īccording to Social Work Degree Guide website, it has this to say about mezzo-level social work: Micro, Mezzo/Meso, and Macro are levels of analysis that are the cornerstones of ecological systems theory and practice. Mezzo social work also referred to as “meso” in other disciplines, is often left out of the conversation. Rather than widen the debate, we need to strengthen the two concepts, and Social work programs need to focus on “the space between”. Has our role been stymied by this Micro and Macro separation? In my opinion, the strength of social work is its versatility, but the profession can’t seem to get out of its own way. When students take Intro to Social Work, are we fully explaining the interconnectivity between micro, mezzo, and macro levels of analysis in social work? There also continues to be a lot of discourse about social workers’ roles on a larger stage. The trend or message from others on social media is that Macro Social work has lost its appeal or the profession is being skewed into a clinical/micro focus.

Up until the last year, I was happily living in my own microbubble. Since then, it has changed my lens of how I view the world into more of a macro thinker. For me, it was not that much of a debate until I began engaging with social workers around the world via social media. The debate about micro versus macro concentrations within the social work profession continues to rage on. Barriers to a Healthy Lifestyle: From Individuals to Public Policy via JOE

Micro mezzo and macro levels